The Gift of Music at Grace Cathedral

Prayers in the Air at Grace

Last night I noticed that it was warm at Grace Cathedral as I sat for two and half hours listening to the Messiah.  I do this every Christmas time - I go to Grace and listen to the American Bach Soloists sing and play their hearts out in this magnificent gothic structure, surrounded by thousands, music lovers and those bound to tradition, all sitting on hard pews, all dressed up in dark holiday attire, all relaxing and breathing together as Handel's magnificent music washes over them.  The faces of the soloists shone with a pleasure and sense of inhabiting the words of devotion in this oratorio.  The musicians mostly smiled as they stroked their ancient violins and cellos... 

Devotion and trust and good will.   Christ was all about good will, wasn't he?  Treat others as you wish to be treated.  See yourself in others...  He would have been gratified that this country was about to reach out to the heart-ful and suffering people of Cuba, I'm sure of it.  And that our black president had worked hard to make an equitable health system in this country.  And that people were baring their souls about the unjust violence perpetrated against young African American men. And that countless unnamed people give their time and their resources to help the hungry, the dying, the vanishing wildlife on the planet.  There is some goodness in the land.  I don't know whether they are the "10,000 Joys" or not, but we can see our humanity rising to meet trouble.

We were told this performance was being recorded and urged to maintain quiet as best we could throughout, and of course what happened part of the way through was I had to cough.  A hideous tickle bubbling up in me.  Deep breathing didn't help.  A woman dressed beautifully in black and red who sat next to me offered me a little tin of round candies.  And those lovely little morsels did the trick.  As I said, it is about trust and good will.  Christ was a human being - now more alive for me than he ever was when I was younger - who believed in the essential goodness of man, of ALL men.  And he was a humble man, too, who dedicated himself to teaching his fellow human beings and bringing them from the darkness of ignorance into the light.  Much like the Buddha, really.  The music of Handel in his Messiah, of Bach in his Passion of St. Matthew or his Mass in B Minor, offers us a musical canvas that shows what this generosity of heart feels like.  We hear and sense the joy of believing, the sadness of cruel loss, and the hope that we're all capable of having lives of beauty and goodness.  As I think I said in my memoir when I was writing about the influence of JS Bach, he showed me what the love of God felt and sounded like through his music.  And for that I will always be grateful.

I am moving now from an angst-ridden, anxious feeling that I didn't like December and dreaded the enforced togetherness of holiday celebrations where we need everything to be perfect.  No, we know that everything cannot be perfect -- we sweep the floor, wash the dishes, feed the cats, light the candles, and breathe deeply, touching that openness of heart that we're all capable of.  And then everything is fine.

I wish love and peace to all in this fragile and beautiful time...

The Pleasure of a Solitary Movie & Why We Need to Welcome all the Guests

In a beautiful poem by Rumi called "The Guest House," he writes:
                   
                              This being human is a guest house.
                               Every morning a new arrival.

                              A joy, a depression, a meanness,
                            some momentary awareness comes
                                    as an unexpected visitor.


And it goes on, of course.  This poem is framed and hung in the dining room at Zen Hospice Project's beautiful Victorian house which we have always called "the guest house."  I work here every week.   It hangs here to remind us of the ever changing nature of our lives, the temporary character of the human journey, the ineffable preciousness of the ride we're on.  It makes me think that not only is there a "new arrival" every morning, but perhaps every hour of the day, if we are open to it.  And our task if we are to live mindfully and follow the Buddha (or not), is to take what presents itself to us.  Invite it in as we would a guest on our doorstep...
Yesterday evening I went to the movies by myself, enjoying the fact that I've been doing this pretty much all my life.  As a child of 10 or 11, I used to walk to the Palace Theater on Washington Square and buy a movie ticket for 50 cents, and sink into a seat in the dark, leaving behind my angst and my own bad stories.  I just sat myself down in the seat, and opened the door to a new guest.  Yesterday I saw a hugely creative film called "Birdman" which tells a deep story seriously and comedically.  An aging actor loaded with self doubt mounts a huge effort to create a comeback for himself, so the world will again love him and he can see himself as worthwhile, or even wonderful.  The entire film rides on this obsession of his to dig himself out of the hole of self loathing, in a way.  I identified with this, yes I did, because I saw that some choices I've made in my adult life have been to create a self I can get others to notice, then admire, respect, and love.  This is problematic, if not damning.  In our logical mind we understand that creating personas so that others will adore us is false, and we know too that loving ourselves is the most profound goal, and yet we forge ahead trying to make out of ourselves something deeply significant to the world.
While Michael Keaton's heartbreaking rendering of his character in the movie shows someone who has pursued the same path all his life, I have tried more than one "career" as I went along, hungering for a belonging and, yes, approval.  Teaching was a most exciting role that I chose in the eighties, it felt natural, and it made me feel gloriously alive, and I thought I'd do it forever.  I was good at it, and amazingly I understood that.  But personal upheaval in my life and the need to re-group forced a change.  I moved into jewelry design, working for a change with my hands, and it felt exciting in the beginning: to fashion things of surprising beauty without any great master plan. But my struggle came when I tried to become a commercial success.  I wanted to make my mark, because I really thought I had something beautiful and unique to sell.  I failed at this because I was not a good business person, because the market wasn't the right market, and finally I decided that there was something better to do than peddle beads while educating the public about their worth.  I turned in a very interesting new direction, became a volunteer at Zen Hospice Project, and for the last nine years have been attending those who are dying.  An extraordinary "career" that has no room in it for trying to be noticed or adored.  It is service pure and simple, and it allows you to give and receive love every day you show up.  People who are working out the complexities of their last days have no time to become "fans."  Thank god.
My heart went out to the Michael Keaton character in the film yesterday, I actually felt an aching inside my body for the person who drives him/herself so desperately to find relevance.  Because I remembered it in myself...  It still lurks there as I peck away at revising my memoir manuscript, turning the pages, making marks and adding thoughts, erasing thoughts, and trying so hard to create a wonderful book.  I don't want or need to be famous like the guy in the movie, but I really want to see my words in print.  And I also know that if I can't make that happen I will have to wrangle again with the self worth demons who screech at me.
I need to remember that as the hours and days and months unfold, many new guests are going to arrive before me, and I need to keep opening the door.

December -- Where is the gift?

December is dark, and fraught with discomfort and melancholy for me, and I have been trying these past few days to find my equilibrium in the midst of this.

December is the month my mother died over twenty years ago.  A long time ago yes, and also very close in my heart, as though it happened recently:  I can remember the exact feelings I had when her death was announced to me while I stood in the Phoenix airport on December 2nd, trying to get home.  The emptiness, the confusion, the ache that started to bubble up from deep inside.

December is the month I allowed a flirtation of mine to catapult me into a "romance" that ended my 25 year old marriage.  December 10 it was, I remember clearly.  Then the rage and broken heart that followed... And all the chasing after stories of love, and all the dead-ends...

December is the month that we prepare for Christmas holidays with family, and become anxious and off balance in the anticipation of this supposedly happy time.  We remember perhaps the days when we were kids, and we snuggled in bed, smelling the pine of the Christmas tree, and we held our stuffed animal close and dreamed of the beautiful doll with eyelashes and curly hair that we had asked for, imagining it sitting all wrapped under the tree.  The Grandmothers in my life were always hugely generous to me, the first grandchild, and what I unwrapped on Christmas morning invariably exceeded what I had wished for.  And now, sadly, the dance has become a a little tired and burdensome, a laundry list in our brains of what to do for whom and will it be enough?  And will those we love recognize us as special and offer that thoughtful gift?  We become so hungry for love, for belonging.  And then we distract ourselves by going out and shopping up a storm.

December is the month I ponder the multitude of deaths of black men in our cities, and hold fear in my heart that we are a more racist culture than I had ever imagined.  And my mind spins about this suffering and I feel as though I hardly belong to this country anymore.  Looking at these deaths is like looking into a bottomless hole, or through a tunnel where we can't see the light on the other side.  I want to offer prayers, but remember I don't do that much in my life, if at all.  I want to perform a ritual to purify my mind and heart and ultimately everyone else's.  I want to call on the spirits of Gandhi, Mandela, and Martin Luther King, to come and bestow their humane wisdom and show the ignorant the way to compassion.  I want to go into the Tenderloin or walk on Market street and ask forgiveness of the shivering homeless men lying in seedy comforters, men whose skin is most often black.

December is the month when I gave a  large gift to a wildlife rescue organization, in the hopes that they will be able to stop the killing of elephants for their ivory, so I can feel assured that my grandchildren and their children will be able to experience these astonishing animals in their lifetimes.  This single act of generosity feels as though it can heal some of the sadness that has shown up during these dark December days.  Generosity is a beautiful practice, it brings people together, and isn't that what we all need now?

December marks the end of the year, and the inevitability of becoming one year older.  Time is sliding out from under us, especially as we grow older, and it feels as though the years are passing awfully quickly.  So, on December 31, we peer around the corner at the new year, and know that it too will be gone before we know it, and that we must be mindful, and grateful, and generous if we are to live our lives fully.  When we were young we loved this ritual of the new year, didn't we?  We were excited to become another year older, and closer to some desired state of being IN our lives and in control ...  Now we think, oh no, why did it all go by so fast?

It see that what I have offered here is a dirge of sorts, a little wail in the night, and I suspect that this entry won't fill anyone with great excitement or warm feelings.  It also occurs to me that before too long, we will be in January, and the days will start to get longer, and the leaves sprout on the trees, and I will be traveling in New Zealand on a holiday with daughter #1.  A trip planned long ago and much anticipated.  And as I march through the bush or sit by the sea in this different country, the dark of December will have already melted away.  

Tonight I will give myself comfort as I begin again to read one of my most beloved books, Anna Karenina, the dark story of a beautiful outcast who surrendered her life for love.  I will snuggle in my bed and read with relish, and feel glad that I too write stories, attempting to tell my own truth to anyone who will read.  Books offer us worlds where we can dance and play and laugh and cry, and then return to the hard, cold truths that knock at our door.  Books are magic to me.  Not a better thing to do on a December night, I'd say!